Alternative Forms of Fit in Contingency Theory

Forms of Fit
Efisiensi unit (output per person) and the average level of job satisfaction are
hypothesized in the model presented here to be contingent upon the fit between the level of
task uncertainty faced by the unit and the internal pattern or mode of structure and process
the unit adopts. The selection, interaction, and systems approaches to fit are all appropriate
methods for assessing the nature of fit relationships implied in this model. Each approach
yields different information and is appropriate for testing certain relationships expected in
this model.
Sample and Measurement Procedures
Data to test this contingency theory were obtained from 629 employment security
units in 60 offices located in California and Wisconsin in 1975 and 1978. These units
administered the Department of Labors Job Services, Unemployment Insurance, Workman's
Compensation, and Work Incentive programs at the local level. The following basic unit types
were studied in the survey:
Intake and claims processing." Received, registered, and pro cessed claims for unemployment
compensation (UC).
Adjudication: Investigated, documented, and resolved disputed UC claims.
Placement: Matched unemployed individuals to job openings.
Counselling and rehabilitation: Advised clients in training for career objectives.
Work incentives: Provided intensive job services and employment development programs for
individuals on welfare.
General services: Handled all other client and staff-related work
Management and clerical: Provided support, including supervisory and secretarial services.
Detailed descriptions of each unit's work are available in Van de Ven and Ferry (1980).
With the exception of efisiensi unit, all the dimensions in Table 2 were measured with
the Organization Assessment Instrument (OAI), as developed and evaluated by Van de Ven
and Ferry (1980). Questionnaires were completed by all unit members and supervisors
during business hours after a member of the OA research team explained the purpose and
use of the study. The data reported here are at the unit level and were derived from the
responses of the unit supervisor and the average of all responses of the unit personnel
reporting to that supervisor, equally weighted. This aggregation procedure is justified
theoretically, because a work unit is defined as consisting of two hierarchically related
positions, a supervisor and all employees reporting to that supervisor. When the empirical
implications of this approach versus a simple averaging of the scores of all unit personnel
were examined, they showed that mean scores and correlations among all variables were the
same for both procedures (\/an de Ven and Ferry, 1980).

Measures of efficiency were obtained from organizational performance records for

each unit and consisted of the amount of output produced per full-time equivalent position.
Measures of unit size, office size, administrative intensity, and levels were obtained from
organizational charts developed for each community office. Due to space limitations, readers
are referred to Van de Ven and Ferry (1980) for details on questionnaire items 526/ASQ,
December 1985.
Table 3

and the psychometric properties of the instrument. However, where relevant,

reliabilities are reported in Table 3. In the past, contingency studies have been criticized for
lack of variation in the data, especially in the contingent variables (Pfeffer, 1982). To ensure
that the data in this study showed adequate variation to test the task contingency theory,
median splits were performed on all variables, and the resultant mean differences were
compared using t~tests, 2 Means for all vari ables (including task uncertainty) were
significantly different at the p < .001 level. task uncertainty scores ranged from a low of 1.09
to a high of 4.1, covering most of the five point range of the component items of the task
uncertainty scale. Means and standard deviations for all variables are shown in Table 3.
Selection Approach (Pemilihan Pendekatan)
The basic hypothesis in a natural selection approach to fit in the OA task contingency
theory is that task uncertainty should be a strong predictor of work-unit structure and
process. As D. Mliller (1981: 10) has pointed out, natural selection is a powerful Darwinistic
force, which "imposes order on organizational forms and limits their variety and number."
Forms or patterns that are dysfunctional are likely to be selected against, while more
functional patterns will be propagated. Performance is notably absent in this hypothesis,
because the selection approach assumes that structural forms must be adaptive to the

environment, or the organizational unit will be selected out of existence. Under a natural
selection view of fit, task uncertainty should be correlated strongly with all the structure and
process variables of Table 2.
The selection process in a managerial selection approach is somewhat different.
Relationships are presumed to exist be

tween work units and the macro organizations in which they are embedded.
Management, through staff units, is expected to establish switching rules that control certain
structural dimensions of different types of subunits. In this study, staff units in the
headquarters office of the Employment Security Agencies, as well as the state-level Civil
Service Departments, exerted strong influence over the structural characteristics of
specialization, expertise, standardization, and written communications at the work unit level.
The level of a work unit's specialization and expertise was partly controlled through specific
job descriptions and the civil service requirements (education, experience, etc.) associated
with those descriptions. Standardization was also governed by switching rules imposed at the
macro level. Staff units developed and disseminated clerical and computer procedures, which
were codified and documented in unit operations manuals, These same rules also set forth
requirements for the number and degree ofwritten communications related to documenting
actions taken on clients and for periodic management information reports.
In the managerial selection approach, other structure and process characteristics,
such as oral communications, level of conflict, conflict resolution style, and employee or
supervisory discretion are difficult if not impossible to control through the development of
switching rules. These parameters should show a broader range of variance within unit type,
reflecting the more particularistic style of unit leaders and personnel. Therefore, in
managerial selection a strong correlation should exist only between task uncertainty and
those structure and process variables capable of being programmed at the macro-level.

Table 3 presents a correlation matrix among the unit context, structure, process, and
performance variables. The variables subject to macro organizational switching rules are
designated with an asterisk. The significant correlations with task uncertainty support the
basic congruency hypothesis in OA theory. As task uncertainty increases, unit structure and
process change to match this uncertainty. Specialization, personnel expertise, and employee
discretion increase, while standardization and supervisory discretion decrease. Some aspects
of unit process are also related to the level of task uncertainty. Written and oral
communications increase with higher levels of task uncertainty as does the frequency of
conict, again, in accordance with OA theory. Only the style of conflict resolution is not
related to task uncertainty.
Other contextual factors are correlated with unit structure and process as well, but
not as strongly as task uncertainty. In particular, the size of a unit and the number of levels
that it is removed from the top have a number of significant effects on the unit process
dimensions many of them in the opposite direction of the effect of task uncertainty.
A review of the correlations between task uncertainty and unit structure and process
allows comparison of the natural and managerial selection hypotheses. task uncertainty is
significantly correlated with all the unit structure and process variables except the three
styles of conflict resolution (which have small but significant correlations with other
contextual factors). These findings support the natural selection hypothesis. However, Table 3
shows large differences in the sizes of the correlations. Three of the four dimensions
hypothesized in the managerial selection model as subject to macro-organizational switching
rules (unit standardization, personnel expertise, and written communications) are strongly
correlated with task uncertainty. Unit specialization, while significant, has a substantially
lower correlation with task uncertainty. The correlations of task uncertainty with the other
unit structure and process variables are substanially lower than these four. Only oral
communications is an exception. Overall, although the evidence provides some support for
both natural and managerial selection theories of forms of fit in the OA task-contingency
theory, more support is shown for the managerial selection perspective.

Interaction Approach Examined with ANOVA and Deviation Scores

Although the OA task-contingency theory of work-unit design is a theory of modes of
behavior, it can also be thought of as a set of independent mini theories of task-structureprocess performance relationships. This approach requires disaggregating the modal
characteristics of the OA theory into its component structure and process variables and then
analyzing the effects of the interactions of each of these variables with task uncertainty on
performance. The advantage of this approach is that it provides accurate and useful details
about individual structure and process variables (D. l\/liller, 1981). Its primary disadvantage
is its implied reductionism. The reductionist approach may not capture the very gestalt
character of organization that the theory implies.
Table 4 shows the results of the ANOVA tests for job satisfaction and efisiensi unit. An
examination of the interaction effects shows only one significant interaction effect (conflict

resolution by authority x task uncertainty) that explains average unit satisfaction.

.

A second approach to testing the interaction form of fit in contingency theory is to

compute deviations of residual scores from a regression line (Ferry, 1979; Dewar and
Werbel, 1979",J. Miller, 1981; Fry and Slocum, 1984). A two step procedure was followed to
conduct this deviation score test. First, deviation scores were constructed by regressing each
unit structure and process dimension separately on task uncertainty. Residuals were
calculated from the best fitting least squares lines. The absolute values of these residuals
were used as deviation scores. The second step of the analysis was the actual test of fit. The
eleven deviation scores developed were separately regressed on efficiency and satisfaction. lf
the correlations of the deviation scores with efficiency and satisfaction were significant and
negative (the greater the deviation, the lower the performance) these data were taken as
evidence of fit.
The results of the unit structure and process and task uncertainty regressions used to
create the deviation scores are shown in Table 5. Because of the low correlations reported
earlier for certain structure and process dimensions with task uncertainty, some beta
values are quite close to zero, indicating that deviation scores should be interpreted as
roughly
equivalent to dispersion around the mean for these variables. The results of the actual
tests of fit using the deviation scores calculated from the above regressions are also shown in

Of the 22 correlations, only four are significant at the .05 level. Deviations for oral
communications are positively correlated with satisfaction a result that is hard to interpret,
given the expectation of a negative correlation. Three other correlations are significant and
negative: conflict resolution by avoidance and smoothing with job satisfaction, supervisory
decision makING
Forms of Fit
with efisiensi unit, and conflict resolution by authority with efisiensi unit. However,
the correlations are weak, the highest one being only18. Since only 4 of the 22 possible
relationships are significant, it is probable that they are due to chance alone (Hays, 1973,
1976). To be certain that these results were not caused by the choice of the base line model, a
second deviation-score procedure was tried. Here the base line was calculated using
the 45 highest performing units that were chosen for the systems analysis. None of these 22
deviation scores correlated significantly with performance.
The results obtained using the ANOVA and deviation score approaches to fit are
discouraging to supporters of the interaction approach and in the past have led some
researchers (Pennings, 1975) to question the overall relevance of structural contingency
theory. However, since this form of fit is only one of the several that exist for contingency
theory analysis, perhaps it is the interaction approach, ratherthan contingency theory itself,
that should be questioned.
Systems Approach (Pendekatan Sistem)
Conceptually, the systems approach is similar to deviation score analysis. The major
difference is that deviation is not measured from a single linear equation line, but rather as a
distance from a profile described as a point in an eleven dimension structure and
process space. The deviation scores in the interaction approach analyzed the fit between task

uncertainty and each of the unit structure and process characteristics, one
dimensionat-a time. This systems analysis focused on differences in pattern profiles and
accounted for all
eleven variables as a set. A three-step procedure was used to analyze the systems
approach to fit in this data base.
This theory, like most contingency theories, expresses the contingent relationships
ordinally, not in ratio or interval scales. For example, standardization is presumed to be high
for the systematized mode and low for the developmental mode. To test the pattern approach,
empirical ideal types representing the three modes of the task contingency theory were
required. Empirical profiles were therefore generated for the 45 highest performing units,
based on the efficiency measure, under conditions of low, medium, and high task uncertainty
(15 units for each level of uncertainty). The mean scores of these 45 units on the 11 structure
and process variables were considered as empirically derived ideal types, representing
systematized, discretionary, and developmental modes. These ideal types were tested using
ANOVA and MANOVA to determine if the profiles actually differed. A comparison was also
made between these results and the theory shown in Table 2 to determine if the derived
values matched the predicted ordinal relationships.
The results of the first step of the pattern analysis procedure are shown in Table 6,
which shows the unit structure and process profiles of the 45 highest efficiency units under
conditions of low, medium, and high task uncertainty. The F column shows the results of oneway ANOVAs to determine if the means of the profiles on each dimension were different.
Eight of the eleven structure and process variables showed significant differences at the .10
level. An overall MANOVA, using all eleven variables, was also significant (F = 2.94; p
<.OOO4).
Furthermore, the results of orthogonal planned comparisons (Hays, 1973), to assess
which means differed, revealed that the mean scores of the structure and process variables of
standardization, supervisory discretion, and written and oral communication differed
between low, medium, and high task uncertainty levels. Where differences were significant,
the patterns of scores matched very closely the predicted patterns of Table 2. These profiles,
then, appear to represent the systematized, discretionary, and developmental modes of the
OA task-contingency theory.

In the second step, differences between these ideal patterns and the patterns of the
remaining units were calculated using a Eucledian distance metric. The resultant distance
calculations are between a focal unit and its respective ideal type, according to the focal
unit's level of task uncertainty. The distance measure is calculated as follows;
DIST = XisXjs 2
where Xis is the score of the ideal unit on the sth structure or process dimension and
where Xjs is the score of the/th focal unit on the sth dimension.
Based on the distances calculated for all units in the sample, a third step actually
tested the pattern approach to contingency theory. The calculated distance measure was
correlated with the two performance measures of satisfaction and efficiency. Fit, or perhaps
more appropriately, misfit, would be demonstrated if the distance score was negatively
correlated with the performance measures. The greater the distance from the respective ideal
type, the lower the hypothesized performance.

Forms of Fit
The results of this analysis are shown in Table 7. As predicted, both efisiensi unit and
job satisfaction are negatively correlated with a unit's distance from its ideal type profile.
Efficiency correlated-241 (p <.0O1) with overall distance (for all units except the original
high-performing units used to calculate the ideal types), and satisfaction correlated-127 (p
<.Ol) with overall distance. Table 7 also shows the component correlations between distance
and performance within low, medium, and high task-uncertainty levels. Low and high
uncertainty units showed the greatest correlation between distance and efficiency (r = - .308
for low task uncertainty units and r= -320 for high-uncertainty units), while the distance
efficiency correlation was not significant for medium task uncertainty units. For the

satisfaction dependent variable, distance was only significant for the low task-uncertainty
units
(r = - .194).

These results show significant support for the systems approach to fit in the OA task
contingency theory of work-unit modes. Departures from the ideal systematized,
discretionary, and developmental modes at each level of task uncertainty were found to
influence significantly efisiensi unit and satisfaction.
DISCUSSION AND IMPLICATIONS
It is clear, first, that managerial selection, operating through macro organizational
switching rules that are contingent on task uncertainty, has a significant influence on the
structural characteristics of subunits. For those variables subject to prescription at a higher
level in the organization, significant correlations were found between context and structure
and process. However, certain process characteristics of subunits appear to be less
influenced by these macro organizational switching rules and tend to reflect the
particularistic style and discretion of unit personnel. With the exception of Comstock and
Scott (1977), these findings and their consequences have been overlooked in many studies of
organizational subunits. Consistent with their findings, the results obtained here emphasize
that the structure and process choices for a particular organizational level are constrained
and limited by design criteria imposed from macro organizational levels. These findings not
only support a managerial selection or congruence view of fit but also have important
implications for understanding the other patterns of fit found in analyzing this contingency
theory.
Second, no empirical evidence was obtained to substantiate the interaction approach
to fit in the OA task-contingency model. These results were somewhat anticipated because of
previous related analyses (Van de Ven and Drazin, 1978; Ferry,1979; Van de Ven and
Ferry, 1980). One explanation for this finding is that the empirical support present for the
selection or congruence approach to fit in this data base implies that little variance exists for
unit structure within levels of task uncertainty. The probability of detecting significant

interactions of task uncertainty and structure on unit performance using ANOVA is therefore
substantially reduced.
Furthermore, the deviation-score approach to fit, designed to overcome some of the
limitations of the interaction approach, also failed to yield significant results. One
explanation for this finding may lie in the difficulties associated with choosing the base line
context structure relationship (Dewar and Werbel, 1979) from which residuals are
calculated. If the regression equation chosen does not adequately represent high performing
units, then deviations from that equation will not be meaningful. However, using a highperformance holdout sample to establish the base-line model did not improve the results.
As discussed, the OA task-contingency model is essentially a theory of organizational
modes. A systems approach to fit may be a more appropriate form of analysis for this type of
theory. Here, fit is explained by a departure from a multivariate pattern of unit context and
structure and process not by the departures of isolated pairs of unit context and structure and
process variables. For example, a given variable, such as standardization, may have
a perfect match with a unit's level of task uncertainty, yet overall performance for that unit
may below because other variables not included in the analysis may be inconsistently
matched with task uncertainty. Pairwise analysis may not be capable of detecting overall
patterns of
internal consistency among unit context and structure and process.
Support for the systems approach to fit was found in these data. Inconsistencies in a
unit's structure and process, arising from departures from ideal-type systematized,
discretionary,
and developmental modes, were significantly related to performance. By viewing the
OA task-contingency model as a theory of organizational modes and adopting a systems
approach to fit, it was shown that fit is a significant predictor of unit performance.
Overall, these empirical findings suggest that explaining the performance of
organizational units requires a more sophisticated approach to contingency theory than
earlier efforts have used. A contingency model for the subunits in this sample appears to
require that fit is the joint product of managerial selection and departures from an ideal
multivariate pattern. No evidence was found to support the mainstream view of contingency
theorists that fit is the simple interaction between isolated pairs of unit context and structure
and process dimensions on performance. Using multiple approaches to the evaluation of fit
in this data base revealed that both congruent and contingency forms of fit were operating.
This result is important because it replicates (although using different procedures)

Forms of Fit
the universal and contingency findings of Dewar and Werbel (1979) and Fry and
Slocum (1984). An exploration of the interrelationships between selection (congruent) and

contingency approaches to fit is an important direction for contingency theory researchers to

follow.
We believe that the evaluation of multiple approaches to fit in the OA taskcontingency theory provides an example of knowledge accumulation that contingency-theory
researchers should follow. By documenting such results and accumulating knowledge across
and between organizational levels and populations, researchers can make signicant
advances in mid range theory. lf future subunit studies replicate the findings on the
alternative approaches to fit reported here, macro-micro relationships may be more readily
understood. If a series of studies at an industry level of analysis or for professional rather
than bureaucratic subunits shows a different pattern of findings, then some systematic
relationships between types (or levels) of organizations may become evident. Knowing that
forms of fit differ across conditions will be useful and may help to clear up inconsistent
contingency-theory findings. Reporting tests of only one form of fit leaves more questions
unanswered than resolved.belum!!
These research findings have a number of broader implications for general
contingency-theow research. First, contingency studies should be designed to permit
comparative evaluation of several forms of fit. The resulting complementary information can
lead to more comprehensive descriptions of context-structure-performance relationships than
a single approach to fit alone. By examining multiple approaches to fit in contingency studies
and relating these findings to unique sample characteristics, one can develop mid-range
theories of fit. In particular, researchers should attempt to explore and resolve the
relationships and interdependencies among congruency (selection) and contingency
(interaction and systems) forms of fit.
Second, contingency-theory researchers should be encouraged to further develop
systems approaches to fit. Pattern analysis, as presented in this paper, is only one of several
alternatives available to examine the gestalt characteristics of organizations. For
example, it is common in both the strategy and organization literatures to examine the
pattern of intercorrelations among variables (environment, strategy, structure) by dividing
the sample into low- and high-performing groups. The high-performing group is expected to
reveal relationships closer to a hypothesized model than the low-performing group (Van de
Ven and Ferry, 1980).
Furthermore, researchers could examine the effects of multiple contextual elements
on fit. In this paper, the multivariate nature of the data was limited to only structure and
process variables, while context was treated as a single variable. However, as Child (1977)
has pointed out, multiple contextual factors can have conflicting implications on design.
Indeed, in the analysis of these data, size correlated with several structural variables in a
direction opposite to that of task uncertainty. Under these circumstances researchers might
investigate how large organizations in uncertain environments or small organizations in
certain environments address this apparent design dilemma. Adopting a systems approach
seems uniquely promising in addressing these types of research questions.

Finally, these concepts of fit may be applied not only to structural contingency theory
but to contingency theories in general. Fit is a concept of broad utility that is increasingly
important in a wide range of organizational theories. Researchers interested in job design,
leadership, or strategy structure relationships have all at one time postulated that
organizational performance is a function of the fit or match between two or more factors.
Each of these management disciplines could potentially benefit from a more explicit
examination of fit in their area.